Current Date and Current time in hidden fields - forms

Question

Hi I am looking for a way to add 2 hidden fields in my form that hold the current date and current time.
<input type="hidden" name="date" value="CurrentTime">
<input type="hidden" name="time" value="CurrentDate">
Thank you.

Answer 1

You can do this using JavaScript.
Include some ids in your input elements, so you can identify them in JS:
<input type="hidden" id="date" name="date" value="CurrentTime">
<input type="hidden" id="time" name="time" value="CurrentDate">
You can then use JS's Date() function to get the current Date. Create a variable as a new Date(), then use the methods on that variable to get the parts of the date and time you're after!
Here's the script you'll need:
<script type="text/javascript">
var d = new Date();
// Set the value of the "date" field
document.getElementById("date").value = d.toDateString();
// Set the value of the "time" field
var hours = d.getHours();
var mins = d.getMinutes();
var seconds = d.getSeconds();
document.getElementById("time").value = hours + ":" + mins + ":" + seconds;
</script>
Here's a JSFiddle to see it in action: https://jsfiddle.net/y3go8hm8/ -
note, I've changed the type to text, rather than hidden - or you wouldn't be able to see it working!)
Formatting
You can format the date however you like, so my example above gives you the date as "Mon 12 Jun 2010" format.
Let's say you want dd/MM/yyyy format:
// Get today's date
var day = d.getDate();
var month = d.getMonth() + 1; // The months are 0-based
var year = d.getFullYear();
// Set the date field to the current date
document.getElementById("date").value = day + "/" + month + "/" + year;
Caveat of this is, that months or days less than 10 will only display to 1 digit (e.g. 12/3/2014). Likewise, this applies for the time, too.
You can loop through the day and month and prepend 0, if you wish;
if (day < 10) {
day = "0" + day;
}
if (month < 10) {
month = "0" + month;
}
and do the same for the hours and mins of the time:
if (hours < 10) {
hours = "0" + hours;
}
if (mins < 10) {
mins = "0" + mins;
}
And then assign the values to the fields, as above.
Here's a JSFiddle of this in action, too: https://jsfiddle.net/y3go8hm8/1/
Hope this helps! :)